Customer Reviews

The German Prisoner

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This is a slender book, a reprint of an obscure short novel by a British-Canadian writer. The book was published in 1930 and is a fictional take on WWI. But even if you've read recent war memoirs, or watched films by well-known directors, about WWII or Vietnam or the interminable operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, this book will shock you.

In a very straightforward and effective way Hanley recounts the thoughts and experiences of two soldiers, a British man from Manchester and an Irishman.
There is no camaraderie, or nationalistic bonding here, just two confused men who get lost in No Man's Land and "capture" a German who had surrendered himself to them.

Unspeakable cruelty is described and acted out by the two British soldiers on their "enemy" prisoner (and his corpse), until their true enemy is finally found in each other.

I have never read a book like this in English. It turns in on itself in such a devastating way. Why isn't this book an anti-war classic? It is unbelievable to think anyone could write about war without having read "The German Prisoner" first. Unlike most war stories, there is no glorifying violence to pretend to condemn it. This short book is a scalpel cutting the mind.